Suburban Anti-Warriors: Montgomery County in the Vietnam War Era
by Aaron G. Fountain, Jr.
Unlike in many other regions of the country during the Vietnam War era, antiwar sentiment in Montgomery County did not stem from a major university, nor did it host any of the national groups that typically organized major protests. Instead, antiwar activism emerged from grassroots organizations, religious leaders, the local community college, and, most significantly, the high schools. Political dissent in the county took the form of more subtle acts of resistance, contradicting popular accounts of the antiwar movement as an emotional and, at times, militant reaction. Yet, the Vietnam War protest movement in Montgomery County emerged as a contentious issue that significantly influenced local politics. The anti-war movement was truly national and even international in scope, but by examining Montgomery County, Maryland, at the time a largely white, middle-class suburb of Washington, DC, several long-standing assumptions about the anti-Vietnam War movement are challenged.